People from various provinces needed medical treatment for respiratory and other ailments in recent days, reports said, while the agriculture ministry said more than 4,000 buffalo and cows have died in the cold.

In the capital Hanoi, crowds gathered outside clothing shops as chilly customers rushed to buy thick jackets.

DTiNews website showed pictures of plants encased in ice on O Quy Ho, a mountain pass in Lao Cai province that is popular with tourists.

On Wednesday, Mau Son mountain in Lang Son province bordering China dropped to minus 3.6 C (25.5 F), the lowest temperature since a 1975 record of minus 3.2 C (26 F), the province's weather bureau said.

Hanoi saw a January low of 7 C (44.6 F) on Tuesday night. A woman and her grandson died that evening in a blast on their boat on the city's Red River after they lit a fire to warm themselves, Tuoi Tre newspaper reported.

"It is cold but the cold spell in 2008 was worse because it lasted 38 days," said a forecaster at the national weather bureau.

The forecaster, who declined to be named, said Vietnam is influenced by weather systems from the northern hemisphere, Europe and China but the exact cause of the current cold snap was unclear.

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